


Lady of the lake, woman of the woods

by just_a_wavefunction



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: (that may or may not actually be requited), Canon Compliant, F/F, Infidelity, Pre-Canon, Unrequited Love, nimueh is just really gay, tiny morgause cameo, ygraine is not as perfect as everyone likes to make her
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-06
Updated: 2018-04-06
Packaged: 2019-04-19 04:50:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,694
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14229648
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/just_a_wavefunction/pseuds/just_a_wavefunction
Summary: It is not the first time Nimueh's heart will be broken.It is, however, the first time everything else will break along with it.(And who ever said loving would be a good idea?)





	Lady of the lake, woman of the woods

**Author's Note:**

> Apparently, aside from Gay Road Trip, my other genre is “chaotic evil lesbian in love with married woman” or something
> 
> (Does any witch/sorceress in Merlin like … survive??)

 

 

 

In Nimueh's defence, it was Gaius' idea.

She doesn't particularly like royalty, or any kind of authority, really, has always been more of a scraped-knees-and-wildflowers kind of girl. Her own position as High Priestess is an ill-fitting gown that she wears gracefully on the best of days and that itches in all kinds of places on the worst. She knows that it is like this for most of her sisters; they all prefer to bathe in the bone-deep flow of magic rather than spare a thought for fickle human-made hierarchies.

And yet, the King requires the services of a High Priestess, and Gaius is a good friend with a lovely fiancée and a handful of owed favours, so here she is.

“Welcome, High Priestess Nimueh,” King Uther says with a sharp smile that scrapes over her name, “and let me introduce to you my wife, Queen Ygraine.”

The Queen steps forward, then, and it is Nimueh's undoing.

It is not unusual, for the witches of the Isle, to love women. In fact, it is somewhat customary; rare are the times when a sorceress leaves the Isle to settle down with a man of her choosing. Nimueh's sisters like to tease her about being a particularly hopeless case, about wanting to seduce just about every pretty or handsome woman who so much as glances at her. (She usually succeeds, which is neither here nor there.)

However, even Nimueh has never fallen quite as hard quite as fast.

She isn't normally one prone to poetry, and it is not poetry when she thinks that Ygraine is like the sun. It is quite literal, in fact – Nimueh can hardly look at her directly, in fear of blinding herself, and her skin feels like it has been set on fire, her hair starting to burn at the tips, smoke curling up and suffocating her. She blinks a few times, trying and failing to dispel the raging inferno.

And then the Queen extends her hand and smiles, eyes crinkling at the corner and looking altogether much more human and much less celestial, and Nimueh remembers how to breathe.

She swallows the flames and presses a kiss to Ygraine's hand.

“My pleasure.”

 

 

 

It turns out that all Uther wants is establishing diplomatic relationships with the High Priestesses of the Old Religion. He pulls out all the stops, too, long-tabled feasts with opulent meals and eccentric entertainers, nerve-wracking tournaments and wine that rushes straight to the head.

Nimueh enjoys all of the decadence shamelessly. None of it, however, can tear her attention away from Ygraine.

“Are the festivities to your liking, High Priestess?” the Queen asks on their first evening. The clamour around the table is so loud that Nimueh reaches for her magic to understand the words. “It must be very different from what you are used to on the Isle of the Blessed.”

Nimueh takes a slow sip of wine. “Our feasts do get quite lively, your Highness. However, I cannot say I have ever seen a man juggle with six flaming torches and an unsheathed dagger, so consider your guest impressed.”

Ygraine's laugh is like leaves rustling in the wind. “I should certainly hope so, since I specifically asked for him. His skill is unparalleled.”

“You organise these banquets yourself?”

“Uther is the one who invites our guests.” She smiles, somewhat slyly. “It falls to me to make sure they come back.”

 

 

 

And come back, Nimueh does. Many times.

She meets Tristan, who is a rather charming fellow (for a man, anyway), and she meets Agravaine, who is a bit on the slimy side but ultimately alright. Both brothers love their sister dearly, and both have a healthy amount of distrust in Nimueh. It happens a lot to her – people not being sure what to make of her self-confidence, or her lack of restraint and deference, or the absence of a father, a son, a husband at her side.

Nimueh responds with emptying buckets of water over Agravaine's head and having yellow flowers grow out of Tristan's ears, to the endless delight of Ygraine.

(The King is a bit of a tougher nut to crack, but when she single-handedly reanimates an entire field of ruined crops, saving about a fourth of Camelot's people from certain starvation, and, at the resulting celebratory banquet, proceeds to completely drink Uther under the table, she can tell he respects her. Even if he thinks her a bit odd.)

 

 

 

“I could provide you with something to embroider while we talk, if you'd like,” Ygraine says when their conversation reaches a pause, not looking up from her own handiwork.

Nimueh is perfectly content with just watching the soft look of concentration in the Queen's face and letting her imagination run wild until the fire in the hearth is flaring a little too brightly and she has to distract herself again.

“Thank you, your Highness, but I'd rather not.” Feeling bold, she adds, “I'm impressed you've gotten so far. It looks fairly dull, to be honest.”

The remark gains her a leaves-rustling laugh.

“It is,” Ygraine agrees. “That's what I like about it.”

“I've always thought strings were meant for plucking rather than stitching.”

The Queen looks up then, sharply, blue eyes pinning Nimueh to her chair and firelight painting orange shadows on her face.

“You play?”

Nimueh nods and holds back a comment about being _very_ deft with her fingers, indeed.

The next time she visits, there is a harp in the guest chambers, and Ygraine refuses to embroider anything without being accompanied by the otherworldly sound of Nimueh's hands on the strings.

 

 

 

The Lady Morgause is a nine-year-old whirlwind of grass-stained clothes, still-dormant magic and practice swords that are too long for her arms, and as much as Nimueh loves Ygraine, she wishes for a fierce moment that Vivienne were her wife for the sole sake of having a daughter like that.

Gorlois, just as every married man she has ever met, has no idea how lucky he is.

“Such a sweet child,” Ygraine remarks.

“Oh, I don't know, my lady,” Nimueh says. “'Sweet' isn't quite the word I'd have chosen. Shrewd, maybe. Mischievous. Unpredictable. Just like her mother.”

“Nimueh! Don't let the Lady Vivienne hear that.”

“You do not agree?”

“I never said that.” There's a smile playing at the corner of her mouth. “Children usually turn out much like their mothers.”

“Then your child shall be kind, and wise, and brave,” and devastatingly beautiful, Nimueh adds silently.

A shadow slides over Ygraine's face then. For a moment, her eyes look like the sky right before a light and steady rainfall.

“My child,” she repeats quietly. “We shall see about that.”

 

 

 

Nimueh is not particularly interested in watching council meetings when she is in Camelot. She is, however, interested in watching Ygraine.

Uther, to her knowledge, is a fair but often ruthless King; she naturally assumed Ygraine to have somewhat of a tempering, softening influence on him. She would never have guessed the extent to which she is right.

In the council room, Ygraine is a force of nature.

When Uther wants to pass a sentence she deems too harsh, she will not hesitate to challenge him to amend it. When Uther is about to deny one of his subjects the crown's aid for whatever (perfectly valid) reason, she will silence her king with a gesture and move heaven and earth to provide the help she can. When Uther takes a decision of the mind, she will take one of the heart, and not yield until they have reached a compromise between the two. And Uther allows all of her interventions – welcomes them, even.

Truly, it is breathtaking.

Nimueh wishes, then, that the King may die before his wife, because it seems she has found a Queen she wouldn't mind following.

 

 

 

If not a daily occurrence, it is at least not rare for Uther to suffer an attempt on his life or two. To keep himself safe, he has devised several elaborate protective systems with his knights and his servants, and the pitiful culprit is apprehended before ever seeing their plan come to fruition.

There are, however, no such systems in place for the Queen.

So when Nimueh spots the assassin behind the pillar, about to pierce Ygraine's neck with a short, grey-feathered arrow – and really, could the first assassin ever to target the Queen not have picked a colour more worthy of her? – it falls to her to stop the weapon mid-air and snap the bastard's neck.

It takes a moment for all of them to process what has happened; Uther is the first to regain his granite composure.

“You saved the Queen's life. How may I ever repay you?”

Nimueh hardly hears him over the storm in her ears, grey as the arrow's feathers.

“There is no need. Ygraine's safety is reward enough.”

Ygraine says nothing, but she enters Nimueh's guest chambers that night, without knocking, and folds her into an embrace.

“You may very well have died,” Nimueh says, breath coming in short bursts, as if she were the one with an arrow in her neck.

Ygraine appears unconcerned.

“I knew I would not.” Her hands are soothing on Nimueh's back. “Not under your watch.”

“Never,” Nimueh promises.

 

 

 

Ygraine visits the Isle, just once.

She steps off the ferry with her customary grace, clad in a blue dress and a simple brown coat.

“Forgive me,” she says, “for dropping by unannounced like that.”

“You are always welcome here, your Highness,” Nimueh says, ignoring the bemused look one of her sisters shoots her.

She shows Ygraine around the Isle, pointing out their vegetable garden, the doors and windows leading into libraries, communal chambers, kitchens, private quarters and ritual spaces, and the large rowan tree stretching protective roots and branches into heaven and earth. The Queen seems terribly out of place, her pale skin, ashy shadows and sunlight-spun hair a stark contrast against grass that is just a touch too green, flowers a touch too bright, an entire island a touch too vibrant.

Nimueh would have never thought Ygraine could look dead to her, but now it is the one word that comes to mind.

“Is everything alright, my lady?”

Ygraine's smile is a bridge struggling to stretch over an ocean.

“Show me your quarters, please.”

Nimueh barely has time to close the door to her room behind her before Ygraine presses in for a kiss, hands sliding into her hair as if her fingers were trying to hide between the strands.

“Take me to bed,” she says, breathlessly, and, “I've seen the way you look at me. Is it not what you want?”

There is a summer's thunderstorm in Ygraine's eyes; a thousand little lightning bolts are racing each other across Nimueh's skin, competing for different courses of action.

“Is it what _you_ want?”

“Yes,” the Queen says, and kisses her once more, and that is as much of a permission as Nimueh can (had never _dared_ ) hope for.

She tries to remember the dauntless, unrestrained, wildflower kind of sorceress she knows she shares a body with, and helps Ygraine out of her gown.

There is a ticklish spot around the freckles on her shoulder blade; a press of Nimueh's lips elicits the much-beloved leave rustle laughter. She tries to find more places like this, only ever pausing to slip out of her own dress, greedy for any unknown inch of Ygraine – always afraid of taking too much, while basking in the knowledge that it is freely given.

Her lips burn from kissing the surface of the sun.

Her mouth is right below the Queen's navel, trailing across a light dusting of hair, when Ygraine says, “He cheated on me.”

At once, Nimueh understands.

She supposes she should be gutted at the revelation of being but a pawn in Ygraine's particular brand of justice – of _revenge_ – yet all she feels is a new rush of excitement at having her heart broken so cruelly by someone so kind.

It occurs to her, then, that there must be very few people who know this side of their Queen.

 _Please_ , she prays to her Goddess as she buries her face between Ygraine's thighs. _Let this be enough._

It isn't. Still, it was nice to fool herself.

 

 

 

“You regret it,” she says later to Ygraine, who is lying on her side and tracing idle patterns over Nimueh's stomach with a blunted fingernail.

“It would be far, far easier if I did,” Ygraine replies and kisses her like she means it. “But it can never happen again.”

Nimueh breathes slowly and pretends she can see the air curl around her nose. “It could.”

“No.” Her voice drops to a whisper. “I am afraid I hurt far more people than I wanted to.”

There is no arguing that.

It is a long time before the Queen speaks again.

“It was the Lady Vivienne. She told me about it. Couldn't bear the secret any longer – quite literally, seeing as it left her with child.” Ygraine's laugh, in that moment, is nothing like leaves. “That should have been my child, Nimueh. It should be. I would care for it, if there were a way.”

“I do not want to hear another word,” Nimueh says.

Later, when Ygraine is gone and the sheets are cold, she locks herself into the library and searches for rituals to bring a life into this world.

 

 

 

When the King has Gaius ask for her services, Nimueh is ready.

She is also terrified beyond belief.

“The Old Religion,” she tries to explain to the Queen and her husband, “is one of balance. For a life to be given, another must be taken.”

“So be it,” the King says, immediately. “Enough people are willing to lay their life down for their kingdom. This is no different.”

“Need it be a person?” Ygraine asks.

“Yes, if you want your child to be one.”

“Son,” Uther corrects absently. “It must be a son.”

In the very tips of her fingers, Nimueh can already feel that the situation is slipping out of her control.

“The ritual has not been performed in centuries, and the magic it invokes is ancient and raw, untamed. I have no way of knowing what might happen.”

“Yet it is the only way,” Uther insists.

The difference between terror and fury is often but a matter of perspective, and the King's stubborn demeanour shifts something within Nimueh.

How dare he presume to understand anything about the matters and rules of the Old Religion? How dare he ask for her help, only to dismiss her council as if she were a mere member of his court, bound to bow to his crown and his commands? How dare he – how dare _they_ think themselves above the judgment of a High Priestess?

She turns to Ygraine, then, desperate for a glimpse of that wisdom of hers, that level-headedness which has saved their kingdom so many times.

Alas, all she sees in her eyes is boundless love for a son who does not yet exist.

“It is terribly dangerous, my lady,” she whispers hoarsely, in a last attempt to stop her.

Ygraine covers both of Nimueh's hands with hers and squeezes, eyes still full of love, and she may be a fair ruler, but fair is certainly not how she plays.

“Please. _Please_ , Nimueh. You must do it. It is my wish, more than anything. If you value our friendship at all – ”

She needn't say any more.

 

 

 

Nimueh curses Uther Pendragon, Ygraine du Bois, the entirety of the Old Religion, the rustle of leaves, and her own weak and all too human heart, in that order – in her ears, bleeding together, the first screams of a healthy little boy and the last screams of a dying mother.

 

 

 

“His life is worth a hundred of mine,” Merlin tells her, many, many years later, and for a moment all Nimueh sees is herself.

A sorcerer, hopelessly, unconditionally and irrevocably in love with a du Bois.

“Oh Merlin,” she says, and the pity in her voice is genuine even though her smile is not. “If only it ever were that simple.”

 

 

 

 


End file.
